1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a defrosting method for a microwave oven, and more particularly to a defrosting method for a microwave oven capable of detecting defrosting status of an object in the microwave oven, and for variably adjusting output power of a magnetron based on the detected data.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Generally, a microwave oven performs cooking operation by radiating microwaves generated from a magnetron onto food, which is a dielectric substance, in the microwave oven. That is, the microwaves collide molecules in the food and generate fictional heat for heating the food.
Such a microwave oven is provided with a defrosting function for defrosting frozen food properly, in addition to other cooking functions such as baking, boiling, etc.
When defrosting the food, the frozen food is placed in a cooking chamber of the microwave oven, and weight of the food is inputted, and then a controlling part of the microwave oven adjusts output power of the microwaves generated from the magnetron in accordance with data of inputted weight of the food to defrost the food.
If a user inputs his/her desired defrosting time for the food placed in the cooking chamber of the microwave oven, the controlling part of the microwave oven drives the magnetron for the user's inputted time with output power corresponding to the user's inputted time for defrosting the food.
With the defrosting function of the conventional microwave oven, however, there is a problem in that the user has to input the exact weight of the food to defrost the food properly. Since the user does not always input the exact weight of the food, it often occurs that the food does not properly defrost but under-defrost or over-defrost.
Further, even though the user inputs the exact weight of the food, and the microwave oven performs the defrosting with the output power corresponding to the inputted weight, since the frozen status of the food varies respectively, the proper defrosting of food can not be fully guaranteed.
Further, when the user inputs the defrosting time by himself/herself, the user usually sets the defrosting time by his/her guesswork, preference, or based on his/her experience, the proper defrosting of food can not be fully guaranteed.
Further, since the microwave oven always performs the defrosting operation with the uniform degree of output power of the magnetron, there is a problem that the output power can not be adjusted to correspond to the changing defrosting status of the food as the time progresses. Further, there is inconvenience in that, during the defrosting operation, the only way to check the defrosting status of the food for the user is that the user takes a look at the food in the cooking chamber for determining whether he/she has to increase/decrease the defrosting time, or to perform the additional defrosting operation when the defrosting is completed.